netdev - Re: IRQF_SAMPLE_RANDOM question...

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Date:	Tue, 07 Apr 2009 01:27:41 -0700
From:	Jeremy Fitzhardinge <jeremy@...p.org>
To:	Jeff Garzik <jeff@...zik.org>
CC:	Stephen Hemminger <shemminger@...tta.com>,
	Robin Getz <rgetz@...ckfin.uclinux.org>,
	netdev@...r.kernel.org, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	Chris Peterson <cpeterso@...terso.com>,
	Matt Mackall <mpm@...enic.com>,
	David Miller <davem@...emloft.net>
Subject: Re: IRQF_SAMPLE_RANDOM question...

Jeff Garzik wrote:
> Stephen Hemminger wrote:
>> The real problem one is xen-netfront. Because 1) it is least random,
>> the attacker might be another VM 2) the VM is most in need of random
>> samples because it doesn't have real hardware.
>
> Agreed.
>
> I'm surprised Xen doesn't use virtio-rng.  I guess it needs a special 
> Xen paravirt driver for randomness. 

Yes, sampling randomness in a PV driver is pretty pointless.  We could 
do the guest end of an entropy sink entirely in usermode, but at present 
there's no dom0 support for an entropy source.

    J
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